Oh my Randall, LaPetite is back! I came back after dinner, saw the newpix and my body froze for several seconds fractions of newpix.

Time. The final frontier. These are the voyages of Cueball and Megan. Its continuing mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no one has gone before.

One of the perpetual "...and n guests" delurking here to say thanks to everyone for all the entertaining commentary.

Oh, and here are all my theories and opinions about the sea level, the river, sandcastles, dimensions, recursion, the liturgy, trebuchet design, scaffold architecture, hash codes, papacies, graphs, time travelers, the meaning of it all, and hats:

Hello curve-makers out there.It would be nice (although a bit sad and perhaps terrifying) to see how the rise of the sea (which is big) compares with the fading of the world.I.e. how high will the sea (which is big) be when the world is all white?

The past is full of traps, charms and mirages, but if you just keep up with with what you are doing it will all be fine.

RobIrr wrote:I don't look directly at the comic itself; that'd be a spoiler! I prefer reading the commentary on the way to it

Me too!! Glad I'm not the only one.

(Yep, same here)

I think of doing so as a way of experiencing the time that's passed. ... that's past. Both make sense.

Me too, except ..... JUST NOW, when on page 433 !! And it was by mistake!!!! I friggin spoilered myself!

I inadvertently clicked my aubronwood tab and there she was, LaPetite! I froze, and I think my heart stopped for just a moment. But I couldn't skip ahead on the thread! And so I continued reading through the newpages, catching up, seeing the bleak mood worsen, knowing that hope was just around the corner, but unable to provide any hope!

azule wrote:Prediction: The fade to white will be a time fade. We will pick up after their adventure concludes. During the fade out we get to preview the destruction of the sea. During fade in, we see LaPetite barely escaping. ~30 frames is plenty of time for her to disappear and for M&C to then appear after full fade in.

Maybe we will see LaPetite entering in the last few frames of the fading.

Called it!

EDIT: Before avatar:

Attachments

Sir Tristram, Guardian of the Time Cats, Defender of the One True Comic, Landsknecht von der Zeit.

azule wrote:Prediction: The fade to white will be a time fade. We will pick up after their adventure concludes. During the fade out we get to preview the destruction of the sea. During fade in, we see LaPetite barely escaping. ~30 frames is plenty of time for her to disappear and for M&C to then appear after full fade in.

Maybe we will see LaPetite entering in the last few frames of the fading.

My data is a couple of days out of date I think by now. I will refresh tonight and start doing updates daily.

Wow...that's awesome Keep making awesome stuff like this!

tman2nd wrote:

tman2nd wrote:

azule wrote:Prediction: The fade to white will be a time fade. We will pick up after their adventure concludes. During the fade out we get to preview the destruction of the sea. During fade in, we see LaPetite barely escaping. ~30 frames is plenty of time for her to disappear and for M&C to then appear after full fade in.

Maybe we will see LaPetite entering in the last few frames of the fading.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! La Petite was supposed to save Time, not abandon it!

jdj42 wrote:NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! La Petite was supposed to save Time, not abandon it!

Maybe she went to get some toner.

astrotter wrote:It is not particularly clear to me at this time that we are not overanalyzing this...

Randalspeed thunk, iskinner, and other blitzers! Notes from the before-was improve the after-when. Some Ways to Time

I'm downloading the original png from the hash, opening in Photoshop and making sure not to apply any color management (and its gamma set to 1.0 — linear).

Seems other image editors are opening the png as Index Color (with some default color lookup table), which, despite its 256 swatch values, is a bit less accurate than true 8-bit grayscale, so it rounds the value to the closest swatch.

Then, I sample the brightness level of the sand, using the HSB (Hue, Saturation, Brightness) color model, which gives me a percentage from black to white (0 - 100%) under "B".

With that, I just simply plug that percent into its appropriate frame for the graph data in Numbers, and fit an exponential curve to it.

Either way, the color values sampled are absolute, despite any "corrective" gamma function curves being applied to make it appear darker/lighter.

"If my calculations are correct, when this baby hits 88 miles per hour... you're gonna see some serious shit." —Doc Brown

Long time lurker and follower of the OTC since the beginning... registered and broke my lurking streak purely because I felt it would be wrong given the current events of Time (and the fact a playlist is being put together) for someone not to link to the magnificent song "Time" by Finnish metal legends Wintersun. However as a newbie I can't post links, but I strongly suggest you look it up...

I'm downloading the original png from the hash, opening in Photoshop and making sure not to apply any color management (and its gamma set to 1.0 — linear).

Seems other image editors are opening the png as Index Color (with some default color lookup table), which, despite its 256 swatch values, is a bit less accurate than true 8-bit grayscale, so it rounds the value to the closest swatch.

Then, I sample the brightness level of the sand, using the HSB (Hue, Saturation, Brightness) color model, which gives me a percentage from black to white (0 - 100%) under "B".

With that, I just simply plug that percent into its appropriate frame for the graph data in Numbers, and fit an exponential curve to it.

Either way, the color values sampled are absolute, despite any "corrective" gamma function curves being applied to make it appear darker/lighter.

The .png file encodes a grayscale image, with integer values from 0 to 255 at each pixel. The value of the formerly-black pixels (all of which are identical, except near the edges where antialiasing has been applied) seems to me to be a much better measure of whiteness than converting 1-D intensity values to a 3-D colorspace model and then taking one of the three values. Right now it's 110, or about 43.14%.

I'm downloading the original png from the hash, opening in Photoshop and making sure not to apply any color management (and its gamma set to 1.0 — linear).

Seems other image editors are opening the png as Index Color (with some default color lookup table), which, despite its 256 swatch values, is a bit less accurate than true 8-bit grayscale, so it rounds the value to the closest swatch.

I am anything but an expert on colour spaces and icc profiles, but I took a look at the raw thing.According to the output

There should be an accounting of predictions....Someone predicted a loop (our castle is recursive) - the sea will come, night will fall and the castle will be washed away. The sea will fall, the sun will rise and two people will lie by the sea.... And more timewaiters will join us.

As I said on the wiki page, folks, y'all have awesome taste! I've loved discovering new-to-me music through this journey, and re-discovering forgotten favorites.

lmjb1964 wrote:CatHectic, thanks for the playlist! Just tried installing Spotify but it keeps crashing. I'll try again later, but I notice on the list that 4:33 has a running time of 4:38.

Ack, sorry! And ya, the 4:38 made me smile, but I grinned even more at the idea of including the one when it says "Single Version" in the title....

lmjb1964 wrote:I've been rehearsing Britten's War Requiem all week, the mood of which fits pretty well with the mood on this thread lately. I'm playing timpani, and I have a lot of tuning changes in the piece. When this happens, I write a note at the top of the page showing which drum is tuned to whcih note, so I can keep track. At rehearsal last night, I realized I miss one, and started writing the pitches at the top of the page--F, A, D and E. Then I realized I had written FADE. It's like I'm being haunted by Time. It kinda freaked me out.

I'm not very familiar with Britten (yet, just starting to explore) -- is there a particular selection you think suits? (And yes, isn't it strange how Time infiltrates every corner of our lives...?)

katakombe wrote:hello dwellers of Time!

Welcome! Interesting speculations on the flags....

cellocgw wrote:You left out The Doors "The End"And The Chambers Brothers "Time Has Come Today"-- thus once again revealing my age. Did I mention I hit college before the first Bowmar Brain came out?

mittfh wrote:A track that hasn't ended up on the Spotify list yet: REM's "It's the end of the world as we know it (I feel fine)"

Then to represent The Book of Aubron (which of course allows you to travel backwards in time as well as forwards), you've got to have at least one version of the Doctor Who Theme - maybe even a completely bonkers mash-up deliberately designed to achieve Number 1 (it worked) - Doctorin' The Tardis.

For when it's all over, What'll I do, when you, are far, away, and I, am blue, what'll I do? Alternatively, Time to say Goodbye (made famous by Sarah Brightman & Andrea Bocelli).

Meanwhile, we've several versions of Castles in the Sand, but how about a Castle in a Cloud (Les Mis)?

REM added after squonk mentioned it lastpage; all your other suggestions now added too. So many versions of "What'll I Do" to choose from! For now I've gone with the Johnny Mathis and the Chet Baker versions -- if you had another in mind, let me know.

Why Randall above us, who must be in the know.Thinks so little of us, he allows you to go.

Is now -- both Simply Red and the stunning Ella F version.

Clix wrote:One for the Spotified Play List. If it has been mentioned, my search skills need improving.

I was reviewing the book of Aubronwood before I coma'ed last night. Talking Heads "Once In A Lifetime" was on loop in my head[... ]

Ooh, great one, thanks!

StratPlayer wrote:I can't seem to get a Spotify accout because I don't have a Facebook account -- am I missing something??? So yeah, a YouTube list would be great also...

But I for one, greatly appreciate your Songtrack of Time!!! Excellent work! I visit the wiki often to see how it's been updated, even if I can't actually listen to the playlist.

Thank you! And they hide it well, but on the sign-up page on the web, there's a fine-print "Sign up with your e-mail address". (I'm not trying to push people to use spotify, btw, it's just what I'm familiar with. I can't seem to get to playlistify.org which used to make it easier to share lists among various services...)

More to come, since I'm still a page and a half behind, but for now, some achy words from Alan Parsons Project (first mentioned by Eliram back on page 359...)

Time, Flowing Like A RiverTime, Beckoning MeWho Knows When We Shall Meet AgainIf Ever... But TimeKeeps Flowing Like A RiverTo The SeaGoodbye My Love, Maybe For ForeverGoodbye My Love, The Tide Waits For MeWho Knows When We Shall Meet AgainIf Ever... But TimeKeeps Flowing Like A River (On And On)To The Sea, To The SeaTill It's Gone ForeverGone ForeverGone ForevermoreGoodbye My Friends, Maybe For ForeverGoodbye My Friends, The Stars Are Wait For MeWho Knows Where We Shall Meet AgainIf Ever... But TimeKeeps Flowing Like A River (On And On)To The Sea, To The SeaTill It's Gone ForeverGone ForeverGone ForeverGone Forever... NowForevermore

RobIrr wrote:I don't look directly at the comic itself; that'd be a spoiler! I prefer reading the commentary on the way to it

Me too!! Glad I'm not the only one.

(Yep, same here)

I think of doing so as a way of experiencing the time that's passed. ... that's past. Both make sense.

Me too, except ..... JUST NOW, when on page 433 !! And it was by mistake!!!! I friggin spoilered myself!

I inadvertently clicked my aubronwood tab and there she was, LaPetite! I froze, and I think my heart stopped for just a moment. But I couldn't skip ahead on the thread! And so I continued reading through the newpages, catching up, seeing the bleak mood worsen, knowing that hope was just around the corner, but unable to provide any hope!

But now we have all found hope -- let me get those hats finished!

This is precisely why I don't keep an Aubronwood tab open... and am very careful whenever I do open one. I'm not sure if it's my browser or what, but if you leave it alone for a bit it has a tendency to start cycling again.

macraw83 wrote:This is precisely why I don't keep an Aubronwood tab open... and am very careful whenever I do open one. I'm not sure if it's my browser or what, but if you leave it alone for a bit it has a tendency to start cycling again.

Yep, that's exactly what happened. Usually I am so so careful! I close my eyes first and hit F5 so it starts at the beginning. Oh well.

A song that's kept coming to my mind every time one or both of them left the beach, but that I never brought up because it doesn't really mention Time, is seeming more appropriate now with the fade to gray (and all the speculation about dreaming):

Between the silence of the mountains,And the crashing of the sea,There lies a land I once lived in,And she's waiting there for me,But in the grey of the morning,My mind becomes confused,Between the dead and the sleeping,And the road that I must choose.

Moody Blues, "Question"

I'm amazed how many people around here know the Moody Blues; this is what, the fourth or fifth song of theirs mentioned?